Know Any Thing About Fpga

[seen12]

http://gameport.tv/

this new devise is coming out, and is uses this technology. It stands for Field-programmable gate array.They can be configure on the fly to duplicate simple 8 bit and 16 bit CPU's, and the density of the chip is increasing all the time. it would me cool if the gp3x or what ever had one of these puppy.

 

[linoleum13]

Im guessing you are interested in programming the FPGA in hardware to emulate other chips? That would probably be pretty cool.

Im not sure how many times or how fast they can be reprogrammed. The wikipedia page on it is pretty interesting though. Especially the applications section:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fpga

 

[seen12]

I'm not really looking to program for them, I'm just a big fan of the technology. this rad girl made a reconfigure computer, you can buy it online. Basic it started out as a modern c64, but grew to support other old computers. O it can support up two 2GB ram and other modern hardware. Its called the C-one . http://c64upgra.de/c-one/

 

[coldfish]

That's an ugly prototype, looks like one of those yum-cha "1000 in 1" Tetris games you find in the $2 shop.

I like the idea though.
Hardware emulation...

see also; "Minimig"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minimig

 

[Squidge]

Yeah, I've played with FPGA's before, built a C64 using one and my own console (far more interesting!)

QUOTE
Im not sure how many times or how fast they can be reprogrammed.


Billions, and very quickly (typ. a few ms at most) are the answers to that (Unless of course you pick up one that uses flash memory, then your talking 100,000 times and less than a second).

 

[dpoarch]

fpgas are usually used to test designs because its way easier to load a circuit diagram and see how it works on the fpga rather than actually building the circuit. I don't know how feasable using something like this would be in a handheld. Not to mention unless there is some other software to program it with program xilinx software is buggy as hell.

 

[Squidge]

If you just want to test a circuit, the easiest way is to throw it into your pcb design package which let you test far more than throwing it into any fpga.

 

[Cervante]

I see this more as a weak competition for the 2x

 

[jbrodack]

A handheld that used fpga for emulation and a powerful arm based processor for everthing else would be ideal.

the gameport looks ok but if even around $100 (us) would be too expensive for its narrow focus. don't think it can play videos. seems doubtful that good homebrew or ports of pc games would be made for it. seems like a decent idea but not sure how big of a market this would have. plus i would wonder about potential legal problems with it being marketed almost solely for emulation. even if not really doing anything illegal companies like nintendo could easily sue them into oblivion.

 

[seen12]

I think the gameport thing will be $75, and it can play videos and mp3's. I think that that the fpga can be programmed to do hardware de-coding of media files.
All so you can now get lowpower fpga... http://www.omimo.be/vpr/layout/display/pr.asp?PRID=10459
http://www.fpgajournal.com/news_2007/06/20070605_02.htm

Ya the case is ugly, but I think it's going to end up folding like a GBA. The idea of being able to reprogram a chip on the fly makes me crazy.

 

[Series-8]

I've seen MANY FPGA based projects fail.
(at least 2 independent 'super-hardware emulator' type systems fade into eternal obscurity.)

They are just TOO expensive to use in a mass produced product, cheaply.

They can be quite tricky to 'program', and won't match the same clock frequencies as modern general purpose CPUs.

However they DO allow for some very impressive flexibility, when used right.

The day will come, but today isn't that day.